


Brooklyn of Ample Hills Was Mine

by flamingsword



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: #Representation, Agender!Steve, Breitbart Are Probably Hydra, Captain America: Civil War (Movie) Spoilers, Doctor Strange Is Kind Of Useless, Ignoring Bruce/Natasha AOU Canon Because No, Natasha is better than you, Nonbinary Character, Other, Scarlet Witch Has Cool Powers, Steve Rogers is Not a Virgin, Takes Place Before Spiderman Homecoming, Team as Family, Vision Is Sir Not Appearing In This Film, Wakanda Is A Socialist Utopia
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-01
Updated: 2017-08-01
Packaged: 2018-12-09 21:23:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,332
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11677341
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flamingsword/pseuds/flamingsword
Summary: In which Steve is suddenly female, half the Avengers are getting used to paradise, and Bucky Barnes can't believe they unfroze him for this shit.





	Brooklyn of Ample Hills Was Mine

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from Walt Whitman, America’s bisexual grandpappy. Inspiration taken from Speranza’s The Way Out Is The Way Down and magdaliny’s through smoke, solid ground from which I have shamelessly lifted Dr. Traore. We are handwaving the fact that Steve would have left Wakanda to protect Bucky’s location. I just really like Wakanda as a setting, okay? Have you seen the Black Panther trailer yet? You should watch that.

Sam turns the wheel to the right, and the SUV turns onto a broader road. The fleet of Wakandan embassy vehicles had split up once it was decided to regroup back at the hotel, where half of the Dora Milaje are keeping their temporary home base safe. Scott is in the passenger seat using his phone to navigate to the hotel in Addis Ababa since the GPS got hit with an EMP when they were attacked. Sam opens his mouth to speak but is interrupted by Google Maps telling them to take Taitu street to the Radisson Blu hotel. Sam brushes some of the cubes of safety glass off the dashboard and says, “I would like to put out there that maybe next time we go on a working vacation, it could be less working and more vacation. It would also be nice if people stopped breaking the windshields of cars while I’m in them.”

“You’re not that lucky.” Scott smirks, having come out of today’s strange little skirmish without a scratch. “I guess it’s also not that lucky for us that we were there, I think the Wakandan lady bodyguards would be dealing with this better on their own.”

Sam tilts his head in admission. “How you doing back there, Cap? Bleeding stopped yet?” 

A tall, heavily muscled blonde with breasts straining against a black tac suit leans in between the seats. “I’m fine.” A sluggishly bleeding hand is run through the short, bristly blonde hair in one of Steve’s familiar gestures. “I’m about to bust the seat out of these pants, though.”

“Why is your hair short? Does magic not care about hair?” Scott opens his mouth again, and then closes it. “Am I staring? I’m staring. Sorry.”

“At least you’re not staring at my chest, so thanks for that.”

“Oh, believe me, I want to stare at your chest, staring at you is like a patriotic duty, but I think Janet would be able to tell from across the Atlantic and I don’t think I get exceptions for staring at people who weren’t female an hour ago. How are you doing with that?”

“Didn’t you hear him? He’s fine. He’s great! He got to throw himself in front of some kind of magician casting an unknown spell with _no shield or body armor_ and sacrifice himself for a country that could’ve handled its own problems. To him, it’s Tuesday.”

Scott’s phone tells them to take the approaching left, and Sam checks his mirrors before changing lanes. 

Steve thrusts his jaw forward for a moment before deflating. “So how are things with Hope?” His tone light, Steve adds, “You guys are making the long distance thing work?” 

Sam snorts. “Oh no. You are not getting out of this. You pulled a stupid stunt for no reason, even though T’Challa was already surrounded by bodyguards. Hey, maybe you’ll treat yourself better now that you’re a lady, aren't you old-fashioned like that?” 

“What, sexist you mean? I didn’t throw myself in front of the spell for the sake of chivalry. The serum interacts strangely with magic, sometimes it can throw off spells pretty easily. Schmidt had magic users working for Hydra back in the war, helping hide bases, that kind of thing. Getting in between the Howlies and spells was useful.”

“So what you’re saying is that because you _might_ have been less affected by the spell, that it’s the right tactical move to sacrifice a supersoldier instead of one of the normal human bodyguards sworn to protect their king, whose _actual job_ it is to take those hits. It’s such a good move tactically that we currently have no known whereabouts on the magic user and two of the mercenaries that he had with him. That is what I hear you saying.”

Steve ducks his head. There’s blood in his hair from his hands. “You’re right. It was dumb. I wasn’t thinking.”

Sam tries to meet Steve’s eyes in the rear view mirror. “Problem with that is that this is normal for you, so at some point you decided that you were more expendable than other people, no matter what your tactical value was. So it’s gonna keep happening until you decide you’re worth more than that. You see why I worry.”

“I see why you worry, Sam. Thank you for worrying. But we’ll figure out how to put me back; I’m sure T’challa’s people have someone who knows magic. We know a lot of people, and a lot of them owe us favors. In the meantime, I’m still a super soldier and I’ll get used to the different center of gravity in a couple hours.” 

“Sure, we’ll get you fixed up.” Sam’s tone takes on a sly edge. “But if you were that eager to throw your dick away, I’m not sure you really want it back.”

Scott chimes in with, “It’s not like he was using it! When’s the last time you had a date, Cap?”

“Yeah, yuk it up. Your girlfriend is nine thousand miles away. Your dry spell is gonna last a while, too, pal. I ... look, Sam, I get that you’re trying to keep me distracted, but I’m not gonna freak out about the change in anatomy. This is way less unpleasant than getting shot, though admittedly the clothes are a little uncomfortable.” An exhale. “I’m gonna need new clothes. These are too tight across the chest now.” 

“Your shirts have always been too tight,” says Sam, “but we’ve always liked that about you. How come you care now?”

Steve shrugs. More of him moves than Sam is used to. “People will expect it, and it’s not that hard to put up with. The whole boy/girl thing might be kinda stupid, but I’ve always done what I was supposed to.”

“Since when have you _ever_ done what was expected of you?”

“Wasn’t that our hotel that we just passed?”

Google Maps tells them to turn right in 100 feet.

* * *

Ten minutes after she’s seen the news, a call comes in from a number in East Africa. It’s too soon for Steve to have thought to call her, and Sam will be too concerned with caretaking Steve, which means she knows who this is. 

“Hello, your Highness, I’ve seen the news. I’m assuming you need a hand tracking down some escaped mercenaries?” 

“Miss Romanoff, it is good that you are so efficient. I was not sure how to begin an explanation.”

“Let’s start with why Steve was there. Something told you that enhanced backup would be needed or you would have kept him hidden, and you’re going to tell me about it. I’m assuming that you’ve gotten him out of the country by now?” 

“The plane is on standby. We had to regroup at the hotel before leaving, and I wished to speak to you about who to contact when you get here to be given access to the mercenary in custody. When you get to Addis Ababa, go to the Ghion Hotel and ask for W’Kabi Oduo. That is the name the head of Wakandan intelligence is currently using. He will provide everything we have access to. 

He and Nakia, a member of the Dora Milaje, are responsible for hearing about the possibility of a superhuman threat. I do not know further details, but I trust both implicitly. When the captain heard of the threat, he volunteered his aid. Truly, I believe he does not know what to do with himself in a peaceful country.”

This information has been accompanied by the sounds of opening and closing doors, the high buzz of zippered luggage and rustling paper. 

“And there’s nothing going on here other than an oil and mineral rights treaty between Ethiopia and Somaliland? Nothing this deal is a cover for?” Natasha begins packing her own luggage. 

“No. It is entirely what it appears to be, but since Somaliland is an unrecognized country, there are many in Djibouti and Somalia who strongly object to the negotiations, even without my involvement. I am told your standard fee when working freelance was thirty thousand US Dollars for finding and detaining a wanted person. Is there anything else that is part of your standard fee?”

She puts a set of earbuds and the wireless comm system into the luggage contemplatively. “At SHIELD I made a thousand dollar bonus for any mission that avoided violence, plus housing and medical support. I would appreciate medical assistance if it becomes necessary; you can decide whether you want to offer the sneak bonus.”

“I will do this. These negotiations are quite delicate and between two countries whose representatives are not known for their forward thinking attitudes on the sexes. If I had been turned into a woman in their eyes, it would have undermined their perception of my power and authority. As it is, Steven has kept me from that, but while the sorcerer is still free to work his mischief, the talks must be postponed. The other negotiators are now afraid of losing their own manhood, and it has them hiding their fear behind anger and disagreeableness.”

Natasha feels her mouth quirk. “They’re unmanned by the possibility of being unmanned?” 

“Indeed, Miss Romanoff. And that is why I have sought your help in this. Someone alerted the media about my arrival and that there would be a story, so this was meant to delegitimize me not just to the negotiators but to also cause unrest here in Ethiopia. The Dora Milaje are on high alert while the threat to me remains, and are unwilling to be sent on foreign missions.”

“And you need an spy with extraction experience to track down someone who can travel globally in an instant with no need for planes or passports. Tall order.”

“Indeed. My head of intelligence is not always the most subtle of interrogators when his king has been threatened. My father used such methods when they were needful, but I would rather use cleverness. Can you track these men down?”

“I can. You have a plane to catch, but next time we talk, you should tell me your impressions about Steve.”

“Captain America makes a very intimidating figure, even among those who live surrounded by intimidating women. I should go, but I thank you for the swiftness of your response. Be well, Miss Romanoff.”

* * *

Handling going to the bathroom is a bit weird. He eventually sits down and hopes for the best. It’s not so bad. Wiping off with toilet paper is squishy and more awkward than just shaking off. He’ll get used to it. 

When Steve has been hiding out in the bathroom for five minutes without making his next move, he thinks he should really be braver than this. He hadn’t turned on any of the lights in his room coming in so he could avoid seeing himself in the mirror. Now he’s sitting on the toilet in the small bathroom with his phone, trying to work up the nerve to talk to the only woman he trusts with this. The contact in his phone is listed as Fletcher Roofing Company because Natasha is probably the person he knows with the weirdest sense of humor. He presses the green symbol and waits for the ringing to stop. 

“Steve.”

“You already know, right? I don’t have to tell you what happened today, because you already know everything.” Her husky laugh is as good as an answer. “Okay, so I’ve been putting it off, but at some point I’m going to have to look in a mirror. And I’m not sure what I want to happen then?”

“What do you mean?”

“I dunno, I ... After Project Rebirth, none of it was really real until I looked in a mirror and didn’t recognize myself. And I know it’ll be fine, eventually, I know I’m gonna get back to normal, but last time my body changed suddenly, I had a week to prepare before it happened, and the whole process was my choice. I don’t object to being a girl, there’s nothing wrong with it, but I object that this is something that was done to me. I don’t want to feel trapped in someone else’s decision, and I think seeing proof that something was done to me might do that.”

“Well, Steven, I’m not sure how it works but I think you’re only a girl if you want to be. You’re still you, just in a different container. And you get to be angry that something was done to you. Looking in the mirror isn't going to change that. It’s not going to make it better or worse. But building it up into this crisis means that you’re going to wind yourself up over something that could be less of a big deal. And you need to get on a plane out of the country pretty much now, I just got off the phone with T’challa. So. You ready to do this?”

The door knob click seems loud in the quiet room as he crosses to the little touch plate and turns on the lights. 

A familiar face looks out at him with his own nose.

“Oh God.” He can hear how small and high his voice sounds. 

“What is it?” 

“I look like my Ma.” 

“Oh, Steve.”

“Sorry. I'm alright. It’s just a ... It’s fine. I guess I never realized how much I look like her.” Until this is fixed, Steve thinks, he’s going to look at her face every day. It’s a new kind of ache in a wound long since healed over. He wonders what Ma would have thought of this new craziness in his life. She probably would have been fine with it, all things considered. He was still healthy, he was still himself. Steve remembers her telling him that we are not our bodies, and how true it rang that the flesh we walk around in isn’t a reflection of the spirit inside, or bullies wouldn’t have the strength to push anyone around. Steve has never felt like his body had anything to do with him as a person because his mother raised him to know better. His childhood illnesses, the strength given him by Dr. Erskine, and now being female - none of that is him. 

There’s a rap on the door, and Okoye’s voice saying they’re leaving in five minutes. 

“Rogers, I can hear you angsting from the next continent over. Go, get on a plane. We’ll talk after I catch some bad guys.” 

This time, she waits for Steve to say goodbye before she hangs up. She must be trying to comfort him.

* * *

Natasha finally makes it to the airport, because even spies can’t outwit Paris traffic. Once she gets settled into the business travelers lounge for her commercial flight to Addis Ababa, she pulls out her computer and connects to the darknet, finding a dropbox to ping Melinda May. 

If the mercenaries are any good, they’ll have scrubbed their data footprint from every accessible law enforcement network. Good thing she knows a few inaccessible networks. May pings Natasha back with a number and an end-to-end encryption key for Natasha to talk to her with. Natasha then texts her to see if New SHIELD can run facial recognition on the news camera video of the merc. For her trouble, she gets the names of four rogue sorcerers known to operate in the region, a list of mercenary outfits that work with enhanced persons in New SHIELD’s databases, and two probable matches to the merc in custody. 

She has the basic information, so she can watch his reactions for what surprise looks like, what suppressing that reaction looks like. She can ask his name to see what it looks like when he lies. She has what looks like a DSLR video camera to record the interview, which is hiding a helpful infrared laser that can pick up subvocalizations in the facial muscles. It’s not quite telepathy, but getting to listen in to your target’s inner monologue is spookily close. Very few operatives have been trained yet to not subvocalize thoughts, so between that and what she should be able to tell from how deeply scrubbed his history is, she should be able to confirm his organization and which sorcerer he’s working with and track them to a secondary rally point. She sets a modded web scraper looking for pages on the dark web where mercenaries like to hang out looking for employment, to find any that mention the known aliases or online handles of the two possibles and then moves on to the next avenue of attack. 

Someone talked to the news stations. She’ll need an untraceable connection to hack the Nigerian telephone records to get the number that the calls came from, but she can’t do it from an airplane. They probably used a burner phone, but she might be able to trace which cell tower the call came from to get a rough location to pretend she knows where the rally point is to get the merc to give something away. 

The Ethiopian News ID'd Steve, so the mercenary might be expecting her and clam up entirely, the downside to fame. She could use the help of someone who blends in for the face to face part of the espionage, and men tend to underestimate women. Natasha can’t pass as a local, and her Amharic is terrible. If W’kabi is her point of contact for this, does that imply she will be working with any of the Dora Milaje, or will they all have returned to Wakanda? She could use a different face for grifting the answers to some of her questions. She has the digital mesh face mask if she has to disguise her features, but it doesn’t have skin tone altering gloves, and it’s not winter so she’ll arouse suspicion if she goes around wearing regular gloves. This interrogation will be much easier if she has competent conspirators. 

Natasha checks the progress of the web scraper and downloads a Nigerian soap opera to her computer to brush up on the language during her flight.

* * *

Turns out, Wakanda doesn’t have magic users. 

A few days later, Steve is still female. Sam’s mostly been helping him train and work out the past few days to get him used to the different center of gravity. If he’s lost any strength, they don’t have a way to measure numbers that high. It doesn’t seem to be slowing him down any. 

Sam thinks for as badly as Cap adjusted to grief, he’s done just fine with the technology of this century and now to being in another body. Which makes sense - the dude’s done it before, but the closest Sam’s had to counsel anyone for this is soldiers who caught IEDs and are missing toes or limbs. It’s not comparable. The whole magic bodyswap situation doesn’t come up much. He’s been brushing up on his resources for trans vets, though, seeing what might be applicable, but so far none of it has been necessary. Steve doesn’t seem to even be in a bad mood about it, which, God knows Sam would be _out his mind_ if it were happening to him. Sam thinks Steve’s threshold for noticing trauma might be a little skewed. He knows they’re gonna need to talk if this goes on much longer, if for no other reason than that gender and sex are understood a lot better today than back in Steve’s day.

Sam’s at loose ends lately, figuring out how to be a help without going full on professional veteran counselor on his friends. He feels redundant when his team are doing okay, even though he wants them to be doing good. He’s not sure where he goes from here, since he’s a wanted criminal even if he was never convicted of anything. They’re all pretty much in the same boat.

Sam’s still recovering from The Raft, from a situation that he had no control over pushing his buttons. Sam has nobody to counsel him on his shit at the moment, but he has his coping strategies and they’re working for him, for now. 

Sam is currently videocalling his mom and niece, eating a late lunch of tilapia with peanut sauce while his momma tells him how the family is doing over breakfast. His sister's kid occasionally calls out invasive personal questions in the background. He was probably just as bad when he was twelve. 

“I had dinner last week with Ayo, that’s one of the king's bodyguards, and Shuri, an _actual princess_. I’m loving that everyone here has their own thing that they’re amazing at. It feels like I’m living inside the Black Excellence hashtag. Everything is so modern they make me feel like America is backwards and countrified. I wish y’all could see it.”

“Hey, Sam, what does Captain America look like in the mornings? Is America a morning person?”

“I’m gonna pretend you just asked a civilized question. Steve and I still go for runs in the morning, lately we’ve been dragging Scott into getting up early to come with us. Which is nice, now I'm not the slowest one. Maybe we should invite some of the bodyguards along, now that I have something to soothe my poor wounded ego. It might get in the way of us being able to razz Scott out of his bad moods, though. 

He misses his kid like I miss y’all. And if he tried to talk to his baby girl, he would be putting her whole family in a bad way, because her step-dad is law enforcement. Maybe if any of them knew about computers like you do, Jojo, then they might risk it, but I don't think they even know whether they’re willing to take that risk.”

“That poor boy. Where are his people? They local?” 

“Nah, Momma, they’re out in California. You don’t got to adopt them. Besides, I'm doing what I can for my team from here. We’re mostly doing good.”

“Tell us more about the princess. Is she cute? Does she like you? Are you going to marry up so I can be royalty?” There is a canine whining and a wet chomping noise as if someone just fed a dog a table scrap.

“I don’t think it works that way, and I wouldn’t tell you if she did like me, I know how you get. It would be Qashana Moore from church all over again, and you’re not even here to make getting up in her business look cute. And don’t think I don’t hear you giving Baxter people food. You are gonna give that dog health problems.”

“What fun are you, then?”

“Jody, baby, Samuel is a grown man who has a right to defend his privacy. And the dog.” 

“Thanks, Momma. I just barely got y'all to stop trying to set me up with Natasha. I know you’re grateful that she tipped you off about the whole secret prison thing and helped Steve get me out, but she has a girlfriend and I can’t compete with that. Y’all wanna help me out with something, though?”

“Sure!”

“I need to figure out how to have another conversation with Steve about pinning all of your future happiness on an iffy set of circumstances. I think he might be doing it again from how squirrelly he’s been getting the last few weeks. The suddenly female thing can’t be helping but he's been in storytelling mode ever since he got to be around Bucky for a couple days. Everything is back in the day stories again. It’s the same way he got after the helicarrier. And he’s not getting over it.”

“So, what’s the problem?”

“I'm trying to fight off feeling useless about not being a counselor and trying to resist shrinking my friends just because they need it. You taught me it’s not friendly to try to make someone better on your schedule and ignore their plans, and you’re right. That would be manipulative. So what are best practices on telling Steve he’s gonna need to make new memories and live now, because he may not get his old bestie back even if he is still alive and out there somewhere?”

“Well, if you feel useless, then why don’t you dig into your other training? The parajumpers must have taught you something useful that you can teach your team, and they might have skills you could stand to learn. If you feel restless, they probably do, too.”

“Dang, that is something we should be doing.”

“And maybe don’t go mentioning losing his best friend again. Bless his heart, but that man has got the worst luck I have even heard of. Ain’t no use rubbing it in. Maybe you could put it in terms of his wanting to make new memories to share with Bucky so they have something to catch up over when they do finally meet up. And that way he doesn’t feel judged for wanting to find his friend.” 

“This is why you’re the best, Momma. Okay, I’m gonna go spar with Steve and see about trading off skill sets. Wish me luck. I love you. I’ll call again tomorrow, same time.” Sam raises his voice, “I love you, too, Jodie. Give Baxter some belly rubs for me!”

A chorus of goodbyes and happy barking end the call.

He’s not breaking radio silence on Barnes’s location for opsec reasons, no matter how encrypted the communications are supposed to be, but it would really help to be able to talk to his mom and her friends about Bucky Barnes. His mom is a psychiatrist and his dad worked with a lot of older career military in the ministry, who are still friends of the family. They all have a lot of wisdom he wishes he could draw on. 

In the absence of that, Sam has been researching ways to help Barnes if they can pull the trigger phrases out of his head. Even if they can do it, he still might have memories of torture and the terrible shit he did to avoid more of it. So Barnes could still have PTSD and all the cognitive problems that come with trauma, but his brain might regenerate out of those. There’s no way to tell how good Hydra’s knockoff serum is until he gets better. 

The serum is going to complicate a lot of things about Barnes’s therapy. Sam wishes he could talk to Dr. Banner about possible medications and their side effects on a super soldier metabolism, but nobody knows where the man is. He’s considering asking Steve to test out some medications to see what kind of dose response and dosing schedules might be needed, but he’d have to be real careful how he went about that. As desperate as the guy is to have something he can do for Bucky, he might not be as careful of himself as he should be. 

Sam grabs his gym bag and heads from the guard dormitories where they have been staying to the training facility across from the shining chrome and reinforced glass palace. The air has a misty breeze from the nearby falls. Sam doesn’t know if he’ll ever get used to how amazing this place is.

* * *

The mercenary, Suwulu Olennu of Liberia, turned out to be one of the possibles May had given her. She now had the working aliases of the other mercenaries, which had gotten her their names and she knows how their payments are being handled, so she can look into tracking the financials. The secondary rally point was a dead end, but the phone records turned up something interesting. She’s got two leads, both going to Djibouti, one to a cell tower a few blocks away from the regional offices of the Roxxon Oil conglomerate. Either someone at Roxxon sabotaged the meeting or they were set up to look guilty, and the lead may be a trap.

Natasha is in Wakanda to recruit long range support and find a way to infiltrate Roxxon to figure out which option is the truth. If it weren’t incredibly risky for him to be in an American airport, she’d like to get Clint on this operation. She misses Strike Team Delta, sentimental as it is.

T’Challa has been receiving reports from W’kabi and Nakia, but they need to discuss resources. She heads into the palace through a corridor that electrifies the hair on her arms. She’s not sure what kind of tech they’ve got going, but the guard at the end of the corridor merely nods pleasantly to her, so she supposes W’kabi’s warning against trying to bring any weapons or electronics into the palace was prudent. 

When she enters the room they’ll be meeting in, Natasha finds that Steve is patterning his temporary physical existence on the women of the Dora Milaje, wearing a loose shweshwe tunic and bright capri pants. Steve greets her with a warm hug, and pulls back to hold her hands the way friends here do. Natasha decides to update Steve before T’challa arrives to save time. It's uncomfortable to report on a mission in progress while experiencing ongoing physical affection, but Natasha has never met an awkward moment she can't sail past. 

“The grunts didn’t have the location or real name of the sorcerer, and if we start collecting the lower level mercs individually then the higher ups could go to ground and we’d have to find their safe houses and pry them out. So we’ll either have to be choosy about our targets or use coordinated attacks. Which is a moot point anyway until I catch wind of the sorcerer. Whoever planned this was a professional, they’ve only made one mistake so far. I wish I had better news.” 

“Thanks for taking this on at all, Natasha. I’m sure you’re bringing your usual level of terrifying skill to finding these guys.”

Natasha pulls her hand away to poke Steve in the chest. “How are you even more earnest? Didn’t I teach you to lie? You’re the worst, Rogers.”

Their meeting with T’challa goes smoothly. Men who are trained to expect and go along with efficient women are so gratifying. 

That’s her morning sorted. She has lunch with Steve in the guard dormitories, where he’s managed to make his tiny room look homier than his DC apartment ever did, with a sketching easel set by the window and a small stack of paperbacks with cracked spines on the single shelf next to finished drawings of people that are propped up, unframed, in the window. He’s as animated as she’s ever seen him, when she relays her idea about showing Wanda where to look for the behavioral triggers in Barnes’s mind. Steve hugs her again. She’s not sure whether the uncharacteristic touching is due to his perception of temporarily relaxed gender norms or the intensity of his gratitude for the possibility of having Barnes back. 

Natasha heads to the training facility with Steve, where they find Sam warming up on the mats. He only looks as relaxed now as he did when he arrived in Wakanda after being broken out of supermax, but he looks better rested. Natasha joins Sam doing spider crawls and high knees, and he thanks her again for teaching him and his niece about encryption and onion routing. 

“If you’re not careful, my momma is gonna make you family, you keep being such a friend to us. We can’t thank you enough,” he says with a little head shake and a grin that says he knows his gratitude makes her uncomfortable and her discomfiture amuses him. Why didn't Rogers warn her that his friends are awful. 

In a bid to change the subject, she asks Steve about his new habit. “What’s up with the recent hand holding? Is it because you’re imitating the Dora Milaje? Or are you integrating into Wakandan culture that fast?”

“I hadn't really thought about it? I guess I have been trying to fit in with the Dora Milaje. I’ve been sparring with them, and trying to move like they do, so I guess I’ve been picking up on the other parts of their body language. But I kinda like it. It reminds me of the 20’s, when all the neighborhood kids were in each other’s pockets. Nowadays, nobody touches anybody. At least not in America. A handshake here and there, maybe, but no arms on people’s shoulders, no holding hands with anyone unless you're romantically involved. It just seems so alienated. What they do here in Wakanda feels normal to me.”

“Well, if you want my hands on you, you’re about to get as much as you can stand.” Natasha says, flexing her taped up hands to indicate that she is not leaving here without getting to spar with someone. 

“Sure, we can fight, but this is kinda what I mean. It’s not okay to just be affectionate anymore. When I had to be manly, it was more acceptable for me to beat you and Sam up than to touch you without violence, and right now it feels like I can hold your hand without you or Okoye thinking I’m coming onto you. I can act like I fit in with the girls and nobody says anything about it. Fitting in with the guys in America was really macho and kinda lonely, and everyone was worried about looking gay, even the ones who don’t have a problem with gay people. It’s really stupid.”

“Man, you need a hug you know you can bring it in with me; I don’t care what anybody thinks,” Sam says. “And how come you go along with the gender norms if you think they’re stupid? It’s not like you to just go along with something you disagree with.” 

“I went to art school, and grew up near the Navy Yards. I knew some ladies who ... weren’t always ladies, I guess? And that was never me. I never felt like I wanted to be a girl, so I figured I was okay with being a boy and the stuff that went with it, even if it seemed dumb to me to divide people up based on bodies, especially when some of them objected to those bodies. I didn't question it as much when I was growing up, but now that being seen as manly is this caricature of invulnerability as bad as ...” 

Steve waves his hands like he can’t find a way to say what he wants, but both Sam and Natasha have experience waiting people out. 

“It’s like every man in the U.S. has to be his own Captain America, like the standard they have to live up to is seven feet tall and invincible, and never needs anyone. And I never liked putting on the suit for that reason. It’s so fake; it’s this big public lie in unambiguous primary colors. Real people aren't like that. I might not have put on the suit if I’d known that it was going to encourage generations of men to think they had to live up to something like that.”

“You say you never felt like a girl, but I don’t hear you saying that you feel like a guy. Do you feel like you are a man, or do you just go along with it by default?”

They’ve all given over warming up to focus on what feels like an important conversation. Steve is looking through a wall of windows into the workout room, where two of the Dora Milaje are using a weight lifting bench. One trades off spotting the other before Steve replies.

“Is it okay if I don’t know how to answer that?”

“Yeah. It’s all good. You wanna table this discussion for after we spar? I’m gonna need to think about this a little.”

Later, after Natasha has gotten her fill of soothing violence, Sam tells Steve about people being agender and genderqueer, about demi-boys and presentation and identity. While they’re cooling down and stretching Sam asks Steve to think about whether he might feel more comfortable in some other pronouns. 

Natasha wanders the palace grounds after they split up and thinks the day over. She thinks about what Sam said about the behaviors of gender, the presentation of it not being the same as the identity of it, and how she feels comfortable in a range of different expressions, from the femmest honeypot to the mascest wetwork operative, but those are still behaviors she puts on. She was not timid when her cover was a shy artist; she was not foolhardy when her cover was an aggressive martial artist. She doesn’t take them into herself. Maybe Steve is like that with gender identity; it doesn't touch him. She questions what she would do if her brain were suddenly in a male body, and experiences a sense of distress. She’s not sure what it says about Steve that being female isn’t affecting him. 

When Natasha was in the Red Room, they were taught that what your nation needed you to do wasn’t a reflection of you, that it didn’t touch who you were inside. It made you useful, an empty vessel that could hold all manner of terrible things and still believe it was working for the good of the motherland. In some ways, Natasha misses the emptiness that provided clarity of purpose, even though they were kept as slaves.

Natasha is not sure when she started to suspect that Sergeant Barnes is the same man she remembers as Instructor Yasha from the Red Room. She didn’t recognize him without the beard, with his hair longer than any Russian soldier would keep it. But even if what she recognizes in him aren’t the teachings of her former mentors, she would like to do a good turn by the survivor of traumas that are familiar to her. 

Natasha sets out to find Wanda Maximoff.


End file.
